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JLA Vol 1 15
| Speaker = | StoryTitle1 = Rock of Ages, Part Six: Stone of Destiny | Synopsis1 = In the 853rd century, Metron is passing on his role as the master of time and space to an apprentice, an android known as Hourman. As his final act as a mentor, Metron hands Hourman the Hourglass of the Gods, the New God artifact known as the Worlogog. The Worlogog is an exact replica of the universe, across all time, in miniature. Using the Worlogog, Metron shows him the Justice League's actions against Darkseid in the future they just averted. And then he shows another set of events, fifteen years prior to that... On the Injustice Gang satellite, the Gang is preparing to watch the destruction of the JLA Watchtower. Lex Luthor makes a final call to Aztek asking for surrender. Aztek, meanwhile, does a calculation in his head - if he has 3.5 minutes to disarm 12 warheads, exactly how much time does he have to disarm each individual warhead? At the Batcave, Batman, Superman and Martian Manhunter are about to use a jury-rigged teleporter to sneak onto the Injustice Gang satellite. Batman mentions that, while laying the groundwork for this assault, he has three agents inside the Injustice Gang. Plastic Man in particular is under strict instructions: wake the group's telepath to snap him out of Luthor's control. On the satellite, the Joker is trying practical jokes on the sleeping alien, when Ocean Master finds another Joker tied behind in the hydroponics generators. Angry, Luthor pulls out a gun and shoots the nearest Joker... who promptly reveals himself as Plastic Man to everyone in the room. The computers start doing things that Luthor did not anticipate. As Ocean Master and Joker rush to help their team-mates, they talk briefly about the trident that Ocean Master got from Neron in exchange for his soul. They see the asteroid that Superman set up to destroy them with, but Green Arrow stops him targeting the cannons. The villains prepare to respond, but Mirror Master says he won't be helping. When Superman arrives, Luthor tries to pass the place off as a research facility, but his plan falls apart when Mirror Master refuses to attack Superman with the "stellar conductor research". Plastic Man subdues Circe with banter, but she responds by turning him into a pig. However, he still retains his stretching body, and easily destroys the array Luthor planned to use to create the hard-light duplicates of the JLA. Doctor Light, however, is neither powerless nor traitorous. He takes control of Superman's energy form and bounces off the satellite as a transmission. He also turns all the light in the satellite into infrared energy, leaving the JLA blind, but Luthor fine thanks to his night vision contact lenses. However Green Arrow was trained to fight in darkness and Martian Manhunter uses the distraction to telepathically contact the alien. As Green Arrow closes in, Luthor holds out the stone he was using to control the alien. It turns out it can affect reality in far more concrete ways - for example, trapping Plastic Man in a giant bottle. Before he can strike again, however, he is knocked out by the alien, now fully in control of itself once more. As Martian Manhunter and green Arrow take down the last of the villains, Batman pins Luthor with his foot. Luthor's corporate strategy to outmaneuver the JLA is over. Superman returns, having manged to bounce himself off a deep space probe. Aztek calls from the Watchtower to say he has disabled all the nuclear weapons. With victory clear, Plastic Man starts making banter with the alien again, but Joker blows a hole in the alien's shoulder. However, before anyone else is hit, Plastic Man knocks him out. With the villains all accounted for, Luthor mentions the quartz heart he was using. Making the leap that the stone is thought-controlled, he tries to destroy it with a blast of energy... ... but Martian Manhunter, picking up a signal from the newly arrived Green Lantern, reaches out and shields the stone with his own hands. Everyone teleports back to the Watchtower as Lex Luthor and Superman have another argument. At the Watchtower, the JLA prepare to hand the Philosopher's Stone over to Metron for safekeeping. Metron reveals that this stone is merely a holographic construct - a Joker reveals that he palmed the real stone using stage magic. Creating a massive smile across the entire Atlantic Ocean, it seems he is unstoppable - but Martian Manhunter uses telepathy to bring order to the Joker's mind. Unable to reacted with his usual speed, he accepts Luthor's idea of using the Stone to resurrect the people they killed in Star City at the start of their campaign JLA Vol 1 10. Joker accepts, and Flash takes the Stone from him before he can do anything else. As Martian Manhunter relaxes his grip, the Joker's mind returns to its dysfunctional state. Luthor then makes the case that the villains should be allowed to leave; no-one was killed in Star City now, and the JLA destroyed all the evidence of the Injustice Gang's plot. Stymied, the two teams part, with Lex luthor leaving immediately via a teleportation device he bought from Mirror Master. Aztek and Martian Manhunter immediately go to perform surgery on the alien's ravaged lungs. Metron, now in possession of the real Worlogog, gives the JLA a speech about the richness of human potential. Asking then to "Prepare the Fortifications of Earth", he departs. Superman tracks down Lex Luthor in Metropolis and tells him that he believes Lex is good. On the Watchtower, Green Arrow and Aztek are having doubts about their fitness for the team - Green Arrow on grounds of the scale the team fights on, and Aztek on the grounds that Lex Luthor's paying for his training taints his equipment by association. Metron finishes his story by telling how he dropped out of realspace into the Red, powered through a series of short-lived possibilities, curved around to view Darkseid on the Source Wall, passed through all the days of a man's life, and visited Wonderworld, before coming to the 853rd century, to pass on the Worlogog to Hourman. A breach in time is coming, and Hourman - and team-mates, the mysterious Justice Legion A - will be asked to meet it. In the present day, Superman, Batman and Aquaman have discussed the events of their last case. Considering what the team almost helped cause, their verdict is reached - they are disbanding the JLA... | Appearing1 = Featured Characters: * ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** Supporting Characters: * * * Theocracy of Wonderworld ** Adam One Antagonists: * ** ** ** ** ** ** ** * Other Characters: * * * * * * * Locations: * ** *** **** *** * ** * * Items: * * Vehicles: *Hourman's ship | Notes = * Pencils (story pages): Frank pages 1-4, 14, 21-24, 29, 30, 32-39, Porter pages 5-13, 16-20, Land pages 15, 25-28, 31. | Trivia = | Recommended = | Links = }}